OVERWEIGHT people lose virtually no weight after suffering a heart attack, according to the first study to evaluate factors associated with post-heart attack weight changes.

"On average less than a half of a percent change in body weight occurred, and that's really small," said Dr John A Spertus of the Mid America Heart Institute of Saint Luke's Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, one of the study's authors. People need to lose at least five per cent of their body weight to significantly improve their heart health, he added.

Spertus and his team followed up with 1,253 overweight or obese individuals one year after they had experienced a heart attack. On average, they had lost 0.2 per cent of their body weight. Overweight people actually gained an average of 0.4 per cent of their body weight, while obese people lost 0.5 per cent and morbidly obese individuals lost nearly 4 per cent. People who were depressed put on more weight, as did people who quit smoking after their heart attack. "That's a challenge because you want people to both stop smoking and lose weight," Spertus noted. Individuals without health insurance were also more likely to put on pounds.

Just 18 per cent to 25 per cent of the study patients participated in a certified cardiac rehabilitation program in the first month after their heart attack, Spertus said. These programs, which focus on helping people increase activity, eat better, quit smoking and make other lifestyle changes to improve cardiovascular health, are considered the gold standard of post-heart attack care, he added, but not everyone has access to them.Reuters